My name is Jocelyn Matsuo. I’m a second-year M.F.A. candidate at University of Louisville’s Theatre Department. I am originally from Salt Lake City, UT, but have been living the past 10 years in Los Angeles. (The municipality is West Los Angeles.) I am a pisces and love talking about myself.
To me, community means a group of people who have a part of their identity in common. Common-unity, maybe. I do believe that all theatre is community based. Theatre requires communal knowledge, even if you’re just creating the communal knowledge in the room while you’re putting on the show. To make a joke work, or a moment become an ‘Ah-HA!’ moment, you need to have some sort of understanding about the social situation. Every joke is an inside joke, depending on how large a community you are including inside. Favorite joke right now:
A: What are you doing under the table?
B: Getting paid.
Some communities I belong to: Sketch Comedy (www.deadhonkeycomedy.com), Theatre (www.jocelynmatsuo.com, (www.poorhousetheatre.com) Young people that use the internet, Rugby, Louisville, Women, The Aclands, The Pen 15 club, Alcohol users, and mimes. Americans, Asian-Americans, Gaijins, Marrieds, omnivores. Thinking about this is exhausting.
As we embark on the creation of this Community-Based Theatre, I am looking forward to the challenge of working with a community to which I don’t belong. I have seen Community-Based Theatre turn out some really bad plays that were self-serving on the part of the Community, but not the theatre artists. I have seen some self-serving work that ignored the Community. I look forward to hitting the balance that makes us and the Community proud. I also want audiences to feel good about having attended. I want them to think, laugh, cry and talk about it for hours.
Here we go!
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